Experience trumps race in runoff

If white people could vote for Barack Obama over John McCain, why couldn't black people vote for Helena Moreno over William Jefferson?

My friend, who is white, was expressing the frustration that Jefferson managed to win the 2nd Congressional District Democratic runoff despite accusations that he has abused his office for personal gain. This is a common frustration among many New Orleanians, but it is felt most acutely, it seems, by white voters.

Is there anything to explain Moreno's defeat other than the reluctance of black voters to support a white candidate?

The question is more complicated than it appears.

Beyond the color line

First of all, let's not forget that Jefferson and Moreno ended up in a runoff only after besting five other challengers, each of whom is black and has more political experience than Moreno.

Had white voters found even one black candidate in the field to rally around, in all probability that candidate would have defeated Jefferson. Seen in that light, it seems that white voters were just as wedded to choosing candidates by color as their black counterparts.

Another black friend who voted for Jefferson in the runoff said, "If Bill Quigley had been running, I would have voted for him."

Quigley is a white civil rights lawyer who serves as director of the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University. Quigley has a stellar record of courage and commitment to fighting for the rights of our poorest citizens.

It would be hard for me to name a black politician with a comparable record of fighting in defense of civil rights. It would be hard for me to name a black politician who I would support in a race against Quigley.

If you want to compare voting for Obama to voting for Moreno, the question of experience becomes important and the imbalance becomes clear.

As one black friend put it, in Barack Obama, white people were being asked to cross racial lines to support a black candidate who was a sitting U.S. senator, former Illinois state legislator and former editor of the Harvard Law Review.

In Moreno, black voters were being asked to support a candidate whose resume was thin.

Image problem persists

It's embarrassing that the outside world thinks that our tolerance for political corruption is so great that we would twice re-elect a candidate who is under indictment for corruption.

But in our democracy, we don't simply vote for or against a candidate. We choose among candidates.

The problem was not that Moreno was a white candidate. She just wasn't the right white candidate.